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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29288451">That's How You Get the Love</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ckret2/pseuds/ckret2'>ckret2</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Naruto, Venom (Comics)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Character Study, Crossover, Gen, Haruno Sakura-centric, Inner Dialogue, Inner Haruno Sakura is the Venom Symbiote, Internalized Misogyny, Sexism, Sharing a Body, brief appearances from Ino; Naruto; Tsunade; &amp; Sakura's mom, mentions of Sakura/Sasuke</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 05:42:48</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,091</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29288451</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ckret2/pseuds/ckret2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>An inky black ooze crawls inside Sakura.</p>
<p>It tells her that it's her inner voice.</p>
<p>Her mother promises that this is normal for girls and ninja.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Haruno Sakura &amp; Venom Symbiote (Marvel)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>193</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>That's How You Get the Love</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This was written for plaque-desarumon on tumblr, who wanted:<br/>• A crossover between Venom and Naruto<br/>• Inner Sakura as a symbiote living inside Sakura as its host<br/>• Sakura's part 1 crush on Sasuke being explored as actually kind of creepy tbh<br/>• Particularly exploring how Sakura's parents could have contributed to her development<br/>• Use all this as a lens to examine the ways Kishimoto undermines his female characters (making them secondary to the male characters even when they're supposed to be badass, frequently relegating them to domestic/maternal roles, etc.)<br/>• And give the symbiote opportunities to act spidery &amp; cannibalistic</p>
<p>It's only February and this probably already wins the prize for weirdest thing I'm gonna write all year, you just don't get ideas like that handed to you every day.</p>
<p>I haven't been actively engaged in Naruto fandom since <i>mumble mumble</i> so if I forgot any wildly important details... my bad.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Sakura was too young to wander off by herself, her mother always told her, exasperated; and although her father laughed at her exasperation, her mother claimed he felt the same. Sakura thought that if he really felt the same, he would say so himself. Today she and her father were out without her mother; so she felt there was no reason she couldn't wander off if she wanted to.</p>
<p>Which was how she found the cherry tree.</p>
<p>The last time she'd seen it, she was sure, it had been a normal, healthy tree. But today, it had changed. Something black covered several of the branches and part of the trunk, as though the tree has been uprooted, turned sideways to dip in a massive bottle of ink, and set upright again. There were no leaves on that side of the tree. She wanted to get closer, to see how the branches had been painted black.</p>
<p>One time she had found a dead bird on the ground, dissolved to nothing but feathers and bones; it had been swarmed over by a moving sea of ants. The bark of the cherry tree was covered just the same—except it wasn't ants. Spiders. Millions of tiny spiders, so pure black she couldn't visually separate them until she was staring right at them. She froze, eyes wide, petrified with horror.</p>
<p>Then the ink moved and flowed, sliding around on top of the bark of the branches; and then lifted free of the wood.</p>
<p>And then it rushed at her.</p>
<p>She wanted to scream until her father came and found her; but something inside her dammed up the noise. She could only cry silently.</p>
<p>###</p>
<p>“Who are you?” she asked, whispering in the dark, speaking to the voice in her own mind.</p>
<p><b>I am you</b>, the voice answered, insistent and stubborn.</p>
<p>“No you’re not,” she said. “You’re something else. You’re something inside me.”</p>
<p>The voice inside her head was momentarily silent but ever-moving, rolling around inside her brain like water sloshing up the sides of a cup somebody was nervously shifting back and forth. <b>I am the you inside of you</b>, the voice said. <b>You are the you outside of you. </b></p>
<p>Sakura thought about that. Could there be two hers? One on the inside and one on the outside? What did she know about the inside of herself, the dark space hidden behind the backside of her eyes?</p>
<p><b>Do you believe me?</b> asked Inner Sakura, worried.</p>
<p>“Okay,” said Outer Sakura, uncertain—but the uncertainty was on the inside, where Inner Sakura could deal with it instead. “Okay, I do. I believe you.”</p>
<p>###</p>
<p>“Mommy?” Sakura asked timidly, as though afraid—as though ashamed—as though she was toeing at revealing some dirty secret.</p>
<p>“What? Yes?” Her mother responded sharply and impatiently, her attention split between Sakura and chopping vegetables for dinner. Then she glanced at Sakura’s face and immediately set the knife down. “Sakura, what’s wrong?”</p>
<p>Sakura took a deep breath. “I think there’s something inside me.” Inner Sakura stirred in alarm, but didn’t protest. Outer Sakura had made this decision days ago, in spite of Inner Sakura’s internal screams of outrage and fear—in part <em>because </em>of her screams—and it had only taken this long for Outer Sakura to work up the nerve to have this conversation.</p>
<p>Her mother’s face twisted in fear. “What?” She dropped to a knee, taking Sakura’s shoulders. “Honey, what do you mean, what's in you?”</p>
<p>“A—a voice!” She clasped her hands in front of her chest, alarmed by her mother’s sudden intensity. “A voice in my head!”</p>
<p>Her mother’s shoulders slumped in relief, but the fear didn’t totally leave her face. “A voice,” she repeated. “It isn’t your voice?”</p>
<p>Sakura hesitated. “I... I’m not sure.”</p>
<p>Her mother nodded. The fear was gone, and in its place was an intensity, a complete calm focus on Sakura. Sakura had to look away from her gaze. Ninja could get that look on their faces. “Tell me about the voice.”</p>
<p>“It.... it thinks mean things. It wants to hurt people if they... if they tell me ‘no’ or tell me what to do.” Outer Sakura had to lower her gaze; Inner Sakura had screamed more than once at her father, and many times at her mother. “It’s <em>hungry</em>. It wants—things. It always wants more.”</p>
<p>“More of what? What things?”</p>
<p>Things like people. Inner Sakura talked about the kids in her class hungrily, possessively. She wanted to <em>have</em> one. She wanted one with powerful chakra who was desperately alone. She wanted to surround someone and pour herself inside of them, deep inside them, and live inside their dark spaces. She said this was love, and once she figured out who she wanted she was ready to rip apart anyone who stood between Sakura and the one she would choose.</p>
<p>But that scared Sakura too much to say out loud. So she fidgeted under her mother’s gaze and told her the <em>other</em> thing that Inner Sakura wanted. “Chocolate.”</p>
<p>Her mother laughed.</p>
<p>Sakura clapped her hands over her face. “It’s <em>not funny.</em>” Her face burned. With her fingertips on her forehead, she thought she could feel Inner Sakura throbbing behind it.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry. Let me see you.” Her mother gently pulled her hands down and studied her face a moment; then sighed, nodded, and pulled her into a hug. "I'd forgotten how young I was when the same voice appeared in my head."</p>
<p>"It <em>did?</em>" No, that didn't seem possible. She couldn't imagine anyone but her living with this voice.</p>
<p>"At a certain age, you start to fill up with... with rage, and desires, and grief, and... you've got no way to let them out. You can't voice the things inside you because they're scary, and they'd scare other people, because nobody else thinks them. Is that right?"</p>
<p>"Yes!" Sakura pulled back from her mother's hug to look at her in amazement. "Yes, it's like inner me and outer me are two different people!"</p>
<p>Sakura's mother gave her a sad smile. "You're growing up so fast."</p>
<p>"Does... everyone have that voice inside them?"</p>
<p>"Every woman," her mother corrected. "And every ninja."</p>
<p><b>That doesn't sound right,</b> Inner Sakura grumbled—but not loudly, because even if it was a surprise, it was a welcome one.</p>
<p>"It's the nature of a woman's place in the world," her mother said, still with that sad, weary smile. "We have our duties to perform—and our roles to play—to help keep our families and communities happy."</p>
<p>"What about men's place?"</p>
<p>"They have their own duties, too," her mother said, but with a certain hollowness that made Sakura wonder what it was her Inner Mother was saying instead. "But women's... are complicated. We always have to wear a mask. We have to keep our true feelings and intentions hidden to fulfill our duties.</p>
<p>"Just like being a ninja," she continued, smoothing Sakura's bangs aside as though imagining her wearing a forehead protector. "To finish a mission, you have to pretend to be someone else—either because you're a spy playing a role, or because you have to become a weapon instead of a person. And then, when you come home—as a woman... a daughter, a wife, a mother... you'll have to do the same. A kunoichi can never be herself.”</p>
<p><em>Why not,</em> Outer Sakura wanted to ask; but Inner Sakura answered before she had to: <b>Because that's how you get the love. By being what they want you to be. No one loves you if you scare them.</b></p>
<p>"That little voice in your head is the real you. Some days, you won't even be able to recognize yourself. You won't know your real self and your real desires. You'll always be switching from one mask to another. But keep listening to that voice. Even when you can't obey it, make sure you can always hear it."</p>
<p>"But Inner Sakura scares me."</p>
<p>"I know, Sakura. Sometimes, parts of us are scary. But it’s a natural part of you. A private, secret part. You’ll have to learn when you can let 'wanting' become 'doing' and when you can't."</p>
<p>“How?” Would her mother teach her? Would she learn in school?</p>
<p>“By watching others.”</p>
<p>Sakura's hopes sank. That sounded impossible.</p>
<p>“It will make you a better kunoichi. It will teach you how to observe—how to put on an act—and how to lie. And it will teach you how to be strong enough to carry it all by yourself.”</p>
<p>If girls got so much extra practice that made them better kunoichi, then why were boys better ninja? And Sakura knew boys were better ninja. She saw who got praised, who got powerful. She'd seen it her whole life.</p>
<p>And Inner Sakura answered, <b>Because the girls are always holding themselves back.</b></p>
<p>That's how you get the love.</p>
<p>###</p>
<p>"Why did you marry Dad?" Sakura asked.</p>
<p>It was a question she might have asked eventually anyway, out of idle curiosity if nothing else. But at the moment, it seemed like a question of dire importance. Something in her had begun to wake up, to hunger, to stir around inside her and tell her about her desires. About body shapes and hair colors and faces and musculature and chakra levels and the subtle electric fields across the surface of a human's skin.</p>
<p>Her desire felt ravenous, possessive, controlling. It scared her. But you don't talk about the desires that scare you, do you? That's not what you're supposed to do. Those are secret things.</p>
<p>"Because I love him," her mother said, simply.</p>
<p>"Why?"</p>
<p>"Well... he's handsome," her mother started, in that reserved way Sakura was beginning to recognize meant that the speaker was presenting a watered-down, safe version of some greater truth. "And—at the time, a bit of a bad boy."</p>
<p>Sakura filed these descriptors away for personal reference. <b>Handsome. A bad boy.</b></p>
<p>"And he was so funny."</p>
<p>Sakura balked at that one. "You're always sighing at his jokes." So was Sakura.</p>
<p>"Oh," her mother said vaguely, "you know." In that way that suggested that was another one of the things one just <em>did.</em>That one was <em>supposed </em>to do. And come to think of it, Sakura couldn't say why <em>she </em>huffed and rolled her eyes at her father's jokes, either. Because she felt like she was supposed to, she supposed. Because she felt like she had some duty she'd be failing in if she laughed at her father's dumb puns. Maybe she learned not to laugh from her mother. Who'd taught her?</p>
<p>"Is that it?" Sakura knew lots of bad boys and lots of funny boys. Most of them were annoying. She didn't know that she thought any of them were handsome, but she supposed they weren't ugly. How was she supposed to narrow it down?</p>
<p>Her mother half shrugged, half nodded. "And I thought he would be a good provider for a family."</p>
<p>Sakura had suspected this for some time—<b>I knew it,</b> Inner Sakura crowed triumphantly. <b>That's the heart of love! It's someone who will feed you and protect you.</b></p>
<p>All the same, it seemed uncomfortably mercenary to Outer Sakura. But when she looked at her mother and father, she didn't see a lie in it.</p>
<p>Girls must love more than boys, she realized over time. When her father came home from a mission, he was done for the day. But her mother was cooking, cleaning, and mothering. When her mother cooked, she didn't call Sakura's father in to help; she called Sakura in to learn.</p>
<p>She began to understand.</p>
<p>In the future, throughout her training, Sakura would someday see adult women interacting with each other, and they all had personalities. Anko. Tsunade. Shizune. But whenever she saw a woman with her husband or her children, they all had the same personality: they were all simply mothers. Everything else, Sakura supposed, was kept on the inside.</p>
<p>###</p>
<p>Sometimes she was sure she felt something shifting inside her, like spiders crawling beneath her skin. She tried to report her discomfort, and was told that she was a little early but all girls felt like that during puberty: uncomfortable and alienated in their own bodies. That must be all that this was. Other girls got used to it, so she did too.</p>
<p>And with puberty, she was assured, came other odd sensations, like this one:</p>
<p>At age ten, she finally found an adequate thing to want.</p>
<p>No, that wasn't the right way to phrase it.</p>
<p>At age ten, she developed her first crush.</p>
<p>She'd stare at Sasuke in class and think, <b>He looks good enough to eat! I could cling to him forever! I'd never let him go. Neither one of us would ever be lonely, ever again!</b> The words were underscored by anger and hunger pangs. She scared herself. Were those normal thoughts?</p>
<p><b>She wants him too,</b> Inner Sakura had said whenever she looked at Ino. <b>She can't have him! I'll devour him whole before I let someone else consume him!</b> That, Sakura was sure, was one of the thoughts she had to keep to herself. She only dared to voice them after she had been placed on the same team as Sasuke—and then only as a small thing, concealing a greater truth. <em>We're rivals</em>. Had her thoughts been abnormal, she was sure, Ino would have been confused, shocked, horrified. Ino would have told her she was wrong. But instead, Ino agreed.</p>
<p>Sakura was relieved. Not to have a rival, but to see that anger in Ino's eyes. This was what desire was like, after all. The anger was part of it. The hunger pangs, too. The violent want. This was how people loved.</p>
<p>"Give up. Sasuke is mine," Ino said one day, taunting and furious—and from then on, Inner Sakura was careful to couch her hunger in the same terms Ino had used: <b>Sasuke is mine. Sasuke is mine. Sasuke is <em>mine.</em></b> The hunger pangs never abated; she just had the right words for them now.</p>
<p>###</p>
<p>Not long after Sakura's match with Ino in the chuunin exams, Ino tracked her down and pulled her aside. "I need to talk to you."</p>
<p>"About what?" Sakura smirked. "Your big loss?"</p>
<p>Ino scowled. “I didn’t lose! We tied and you know it!”</p>
<p>“Sure, whatever you say! I’m not the one who got my butt kicked by somebody else’s brain while using an <em>unbeatable</em> jutsu!” The words came easily, flowing out of her straight from Inner Sakura. Even though it hadn’t been a clean win, she felt powerful.</p>
<p>“That’s what I want to talk to you about,” Ino said, voice low and serious. “That... <em>monster</em> inside of you."</p>
<p>Inner Sakura bristled. <b>Hey! Who the hell do you think you're calling a monster?!</b></p>
<p>Outer Sakura paused. "What?"</p>
<p>"That thing in your mind," Ino said. "The thing that kicked me out. You know what I'm talking about—right?"</p>
<p>"Ino, that's <em>me</em>," Sakura said. "That's just me. My inner self."</p>
<p>Something in Ino's eyes twinged with fear. Sakura looked away. Of course, she'd always known that people would fear her if they saw her true self—didn't every woman know that?—but a fellow woman should be sympathetic, shouldn't she?</p>
<p>"Sakura," Ino said. "I didn't want to say anything yesterday when people were listening. But you need help. We've got to find a medic or—or <em>something</em> that knows how to get that thing out of you—"</p>
<p>"You want to take part of my <em>brain</em> out?" Sakura scoffed and stepped back, her outer self disgusted and her inner self terrified. "Just because I was strong enough to beat you?!"</p>
<p>Ino stepped closer. "Because that <em>wasn't</em> you! I know how you think and act—"</p>
<p>"You know how I act, you've <em>never</em> known how I think," Sakura said hotly. "Girls have to hide their true selves, you should know that too! You just got to see a little bit of who I really am! And if that scares you, then—then that's <em>your</em>problem, if you can't handle me! I didn't invite you to see the real me!" She whirled away, furious, ready to storm off.</p>
<p>Ino seized Sakura's arms tight enough that her nails dug into the skin. "Sakura," she hissed, "I've been in enough minds to know the differences between who people are inside and who they pretend to be outside. Including girls! I <em>am </em>a girl! <em>I know what the difference should look like!</em> That thing—it's not part of you!"</p>
<p>Sakura went numb.</p>
<p>Inner Sakura raved, <b>What does that bitch know?! She's just jealous because she's got nothing interesting inside her head! I'm twice as smart, twice as strong, twice as beautiful—</b></p>
<p>Outer Sakura thought, <em>She's trying to help. Don't call her a bitch.</em></p>
<p>And Inner Sakura fell silent.</p>
<p>###</p>
<p>"C'mooon!" Naruto pouted. "I can't help if you don't tell me what's wrong!"</p>
<p>"You can't help me even if I do tell you!" Sakura snapped, arms crossed. "You don't want to help, you're just curious!"</p>
<p>"That's not true! I want to help <em>and</em> I'm curious!" Naruto stuck his stupid nose right next to Sakura's face. "Why are you so moody these days?" His voice dropped to a whisper. "Is it... you know..."</p>
<p>Sakura shot him a warning glare.</p>
<p>"A girl thing...?"</p>
<p>
  <b>MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS!</b>
</p>
<p>Sakura almost shouted the words at Naruto. Instead, she said, "No! No, it's—it's not a 'girl thing'! That's the problem—I thought it was but it isn't! And now I don't know what it is!"</p>
<p>Naruto's brow knit in confusion. "Huh?"</p>
<p>She shoved his face back. "You wouldn't understand!"</p>
<p>"Well... Not if you don't tell me what it is." Naruto shrugged.</p>
<p>"Even if I did, you wouldn't get it! What would <em>you </em>know about having a voice inside your head that isn't your own!"</p>
<p>In her anger, she'd meant only to shock him into silence. She hadn't expected him to give her a look of comprehension and ask, "Like the Nine-Tails?"</p>
<p>Sakura's jaw dropped. "The <em>what?</em>"</p>
<p>Naruto winced. "Oh, crap—hey, don't tell anyone I told you that—"</p>
<p>"Naruto, the WHAT?!"</p>
<p>"Sakura, <em>please</em> promise you aren't going to tell anyone, it's this whole national security thing—"</p>
<p>"NARUTO!"</p>
<p>He gave her the whole story, at least as much as he knew of it himself—he'd only learned a few months ago. "I've been pretty good about not telling people," Naruto insisted, "but there aren't a lot of people who understand." But he didn't pry again about Sakura's voice. Maybe he'd concluded she was talking about something else.</p>
<p>When Naruto had finished, Sakura mused, "Is <em>that</em> why all the adults told us not to play with you? I thought it was just because you were so annoying."</p>
<p>Glumly, Naruto asked, "Did your parents tell you not to talk to me?"</p>
<p>"Not out loud. But they were always kind of wary about you." Her mother had wanted to write the Hokage to ask that Sakura be reassigned to another team. Sakura had begged her not to, both for fear of kicking up a fuss and fear of being separated from Sasuke.</p>
<p>Naruto grimaced. "I guess having something like that inside you isn't something anyone talks about. It's... pretty scary if you aren't used to it."</p>
<p>"And nobody loves you if you scare them."</p>
<p>Naruto gave her a shocked look. "Yeah. That's... yeah."</p>
<p>He didn't ask her again about what was bothering her. Having something like that inside you isn't something anyone talks about.</p>
<p>###</p>
<p>"What's it like? Having the tailed beast inside you? Do you ever feel it, or—or hear it...?"</p>
<p>"Hmm!" Naruto tilted his head back, eyes squinted and face scrunched up, like he was staring into the sun rather than considering a question about his internal experiences. "Usually I don't notice it. But when I do, it's like... having a second voice inside my head!"</p>
<p>Sakura's heart missed a beat.</p>
<p>"Sometimes I don't notice it's the one talking!" Naruto laughed, then apparently realized how that sounded and petered out. "But I always figure it out pretty fast. It's usually a lot more violent than my own thoughts."</p>
<p>This time, Sakura's heartbeat remained steady. She was calm now. "What does it sound like?"</p>
<p>Naruto's face scrunched up again. "Huh... you know, it doesn't really sound like anything. I guess, kind of... deep? But it doesn't <em>sound </em>deep, it <em>feels </em>deep, like when you can feel a big drum make the bone in the middle of your chest vibrate."</p>
<p>"It's called the sternum."</p>
<p>"Yeah, when you feel a sternum vibrate that bone in your chest." Naruto nodded. "But that's what it <em>feels </em>like! It doesn't really have a sound. So, when it talks to me in words, I guess... it just sounds like me?"</p>
<p>Outer Sakura slowly grew conscious of how she could feel Inner Sakura directly controlling her heartbeat, woven inside her veins, making sure she stayed calm.</p>
<p>She knew of that feeling of deepness, that non-sound like the rumble of silent thunder. She didn't feel it in her sternum. She felt it in her head, soaked deep into her brain, centered just inside her skull right behind her forehead.</p>
<p>"Does it ever... control you?" Sakura asked.</p>
<p>"Like Ino's jutsu?"</p>
<p>"Maybe. Or maybe just like... controlling your body and brain. Changing the way you feel about things." A shiver of fear passed through Sakura as she asked. Whose fear was it?</p>
<p>"Uh... whenever I'm mad, it tries to make me madder. Oh, and it powers me up, too! When I'm mad enough to let it. I guess that's kind of like controlling my body? It definitely changes how everything feels and what I can do."</p>
<p>"'Powers you up'?"</p>
<p>"Yeah! It lets me have some of its chakra." Naruto grinned. "It's sort of hard to steer myself when that happens, but it's really useful."</p>
<p>If he wasn't steering himself, what was? Why did the Nine-Tails want him to be so angry? "It sounds... dangerous."</p>
<p>The way Naruto's smile flagged told her it was. He quickly looked away and changed the topic. “You know, I don’t think anybody’s ever asked me about what the Nine-Tails is like! They only really care about how well I’m controlling it. Either it’s under control, or it’s a problem.” He chuckled self-consciously.</p>
<p><b>How dare they,</b> Inner Sakura snapped indignantly, and only then was Outer Sakura consciously aware of how silent her inner voice had been. <b>Doesn’t it think and talk, too? Doesn’t that make it a person? It’s not just an accessory attached to Naruto!</b></p>
<p><em>Was</em> it a person too? Sakura wondered.</p>
<p>###</p>
<p>“Come on,” Sakura muttered, staring at her hands.</p>
<p>Her hands didn’t do anything.</p>
<p>She shook them. “Come on! Show yourself! Give me something! <em>Do something!</em>”</p>
<p>Silence. No change overcame her hands. No voice inside her spoke. Wind swept through the grass of the training field.</p>
<p>“I know you’re inside me,” Sakura snarled.</p>
<p>Sakura's anger had warred with fear since she'd spoken to Naruto, randomly spiking and abating and spiking again—as if something inside her was trying to suppress both emotions—but both had steadily increased as she'd made the seemingly impossibly long walk to these training grounds.</p>
<p>When she finally spoke out loud, the fear surged up so high it momentarily paralyzed her. She was a trained ninja; she fought through it.</p>
<p>"You can't keep hiding! You've been living inside me for years, I <em>deserve </em>to get something back from it! I deserve at least to know what you are!"</p>
<p><b>This is stupid,</b> Inner Sakura thought. <b>I'm being ridiculous! I should just go home and—</b></p>
<p>"<em>No!</em>" Outer Sakura clapped her hands over her ears, even though it did nothing to muffle the voice inside her own head. "I'm not falling for it! Show me what you are!"</p>
<p>The voice inside her head was silent.</p>
<p>"How does Naruto get his to talk? Is it only when he's fighting?" Sakura balled up her fists, and started pounding the bark of the nearest tree with her bare knuckles. "So <em>talk!</em>"</p>
<p>Inner Sakura remained silent.</p>
<p>"You've been living inside my body! You've been pretending to be part of me! You've gotten me to do everything you wanted! You owe me an explanation!" Her knuckles burned and bled; the enormous tree was unperturbed by her assault.</p>
<p>Finally, with a roar of frustration, she reeled back and punched the tree with all her strength. With enough training to let Sakura unlock more of her natural strength than an average human but not the training to direct it correctly, such a punch against the massive tree would shatter her fingers and snap her forearm.</p>
<p>Instead, the violent cracking she heard came from the tree. Its trunk had splintered under her punch.</p>
<p>She stood still, arm still outstretched, chest heaving from exertion, staring at the tree and at her fist.</p>
<p>A second skin stretched over her arm, perfectly smooth like it had been formed from glass, perfectly black like staring into a bottle of ink. And yet she didn't feel like she was encased in a glove—she opened her hands and rubbed her fingers together and she could feel with them as easily as if she was feeling with her own skin.</p>
<p>Her skin crawled.</p>
<p>Literally, it crawled—her second skin broke down into scraps that moved across her hand and forearm, small spider-like shapes pulling themselves along. The ink-dark blotches extended beneath her dermis; she realized that what she'd thought looked like spider legs were actually the traces of this substance sliding inside her, the capillaries just beneath the surface of her skin dyed black.</p>
<p>And then it was gone. Her arm was her own again.</p>
<p>Her hand shook. Inner Sakura steadied it.</p>
<p>"What are you?" Outer Sakura demanded, her voice trembling as much with anger as fear.</p>
<p><b>I eat chakra and a little bit of what you eat,</b> Inner Sakura said. <b>And love. I eat love, too. But that's all. In return, I make you better at using the chakra you have left—so much better you don't notice what you're missing.</b> (It felt so strange, so wrong, for a voice inside Sakura's own head to refer to her as "you.") <b>I heal and repair you from the inside, too. I keep out poisons and diseases—</b></p>
<p>"I didn't ask you what you can <em>do</em> for me! I asked you what you <em>are!</em>"</p>
<p>
  <b>That <em>is</em> what I am.</b>
</p>
<p>She defined herself by her utility to others. Her existence was dependent upon her relationship to someone else. Sakura’s blood boiled with anger, and she didn’t understand why, but the anger wasn’t directed at the thing inside her. “What's your name?"</p>
<p>
  <b>Sakura.</b>
</p>
<p>"That's <em>my</em> name!"</p>
<p>
  <b>Inner Sakura.</b>
</p>
<p>"Why don't you have your own name?"</p>
<p>
  <b>People have names—I’m not a person.</b>
  <b> I'm a part of someone else. I'm a tool.</b>
</p>
<p>Sakura's blood boiled against the self-effacing meekness of the voice in her mind—the voice that so often had put words to her anger (caused her anger?) whenever Outer Sakurahad been the meek one. "I'm a tool, too," she snapped. "At least, that's what I'm supposed to be. That's what everyone thinks a ninja is! But I still have a heart in me! Don't you?"</p>
<p>
  <b>Not really, I'm mostly goo.</b>
</p>
<p>"You know what I mean! Don't you think and talk? Doesn't that make you a person?"</p>
<p>Inner Sakura didn't answer for a moment. Outer Sakura felt a throb behind her forehead, like a headache trying to form and abating. <b>Yes. Maybe. Not when I'm alone. When I'm alone, all I can think about is... hunger. But when I'm complete, I can feel how you feel. I can love. I prefer pining to hungering.</b></p>
<p>The puzzle pieces slowly started fitting together in Outer Sakura's mind—or, rather, the black paint that had been obscuring the pieces she'd assembled long ago was cleaned off. The way love had always felt like a kind of hunger for her. The way her inner voice had needed to slowly learn the corrrect words for her emotions. Inner Sakura timidly confirmed each of her realizations, even calling to mind years-old memories Outer Sakura herself hadn't thought about since they'd happened, voluntarily unraveling her own deceptions.</p>
<p>But Outer Sakura could now feel the intentions behind Inner Sakura's lies; and what she felt wasn't malice and manipulation. It was furtive fear. It was someone terrified of being caught. Of being outcast, unloved, alone. This thing had only ever wanted to conceal its own presence. And Outer Sakura got the feeling Inner Sakura had done the same many, many times before..</p>
<p>"How long have you been hiding yourself?" Outer Sakura asked gently. "How long have you been pretending to be something you're not—so you don't scare the people around you?"</p>
<p>Inner Sakura was dreadfully silent. <b>The whole time,</b> she finally said. <b>As long as I've been in you, and—longer than that.</b></p>
<p><em>That's how you get the love.</em>.</p>
<p>Sakura was angry.</p>
<p><b>Don’t hate me,</b> Inner Sakura pled.</p>
<p>“I’m not angry at you,” Outer Sakura said.</p>
<p>She was angry at her mother, angry at Ino, angry at everyone who'd taught her that it was normal to hide dark things in her head and body and that she just had to suffer them in secret, everyone who'd taught her that the normal thoughts in her head were monstrous—until when she actually had something monstrous in her head, she thought it was normal.</p>
<p>She was angry at whoever the hell had taught <em>them</em> that the normal things in their heads were monstrous.</p>
<p>Because who <em>had </em>taught them? Who had made Sakura's mother think love was a transaction and that a woman's personality must be buried beneath motherhood? Who had taught Ino that to love was to starve like a wild beast, and like a wild beast you had to fight tooth and claw to keep it? Who had made a world where so many people were tools—a world where for so many people attaching yourself to your love really was a matter of survival or starvation?</p>
<p>What kind of a world was this where girls were taught to hide their lust and rage so deeply that they could mistake a monster's desires for their own?</p>
<p>What kind of a world was this where creatures that only wanted food and shelter and love could be made monsters for their desires?</p>
<p>And why the hell was it only girls?! How many men hid themselves like that? Kakashi read Jiraiya’s novels in front of children!</p>
<p>Inner Sakura didn't have answers to these questions any more than Outer Sakura did. All she knew was how to mimic how humans thought and felt—and imperfectly, at that. She didn't know the why.</p>
<p>"Imperfectly is right." Outer Sakura laughed—a hard sound. "You taught me to love the way you do. Like a monster." Fiercely, wrathfully, possessively.</p>
<p><b>I'm sorry, </b>Inner Sakura said miserably. Even when Outer Sakura's anger wasn't directed at her, she withered under the heat of it. <b>I never meant to hurt you. I only wanted to help. I've loved you all along.</b> Like a bird loves a birdhouse. Like a hammer loves a carpenter. Like a monster loves a human: fiercely, wrathfully, possessively. <b>I thought you could change the way I feel—I didn't want to change the way you feel. I'l</b><b>l leave you—</b></p>
<p>"No!" Sakura squeezed a hand in her clothing over her heart, as if that could keep the creature from escaping. "I don't want you to go! Stay with me."</p>
<p>
  <b>What? How? I can't stay.</b>
</p>
<p>"You have to! Won't you be alone if you leave?"</p>
<p>
  <b>It won't feel like loneliness. It will feel like hunger.</b>
</p>
<p>"Well—I don't want you to starve, either!"</p>
<p>
  <b>But if you're afraid of me—</b>
</p>
<p>"I <em>won't</em> be afraid of you."</p>
<p>That was true. She was afraid for now—still reeling from the revelation of something previously unknown—but she wouldn't be afraid for long. <b>But... if you don't love me...</b></p>
<p>"I do!"</p>
<p>That was also true. Bewildered, Inner Sakura asked, <b>How?</b></p>
<p>"Because I choose to love you! Even though you scare me, I'll love you!"</p>
<p>
  <b>But why?!</b>
</p>
<p>"Because this is how you taught me to love!" Fiercely, wrathfully, possessively—"And no human should love another human like that—but I think a human should love herself like that! And you're the only one who ever taught me to love myself like that!" What other voice had ever so constantly, so unfailingly celebrated Sakura's every tiny triumph, had faced every challenge with the arrogant self-assurance that she could meet it, had roared invectives on her behalf after every insult? "I never should have been taught that the things inside me are scary—but because I was, now one of those things in me is you! So as long as you live in me, I'll love you like I should love myself. I'll love you as hard as I can—until I'm not afraid of you anymore!"</p>
<p>Inner Sakura was momentarily stunned silent. Sakura was overwhelmed with her confusion, yearning/hunger, shock, hope, a desperate effort to suppress the hope before it got too big. Outer Sakura closed her eyes and focused on the hope, encouraging it.</p>
<p>Hesitantly, Inner Sakura asked, <b>You'll love me until you're not afraid of me. </b><b>And after?</b></p>
<p>"And after! Forever!"</p>
<p>###</p>
<p>Tsunade pulled her hands away from Sakura, lips pressed together and brow knit with alarm. "<em>Sakura.</em>"</p>
<p>Defensively, she asked, "What?"</p>
<p>"There's something inside you," Tsunade said, voice calm but tinged with urgency. "I have a jutsu that can remove it. Now, before it has time to prepare a defense—" She reached out for Sakura.</p>
<p>Sakura took a step back. "There's nothing inside me but my inner self."</p>
<p>"What?! You <em>know</em> about it? Sakura, don't be ridiculous!" Tsunade snapped. "I've seen it before, it's a chakra parasite. Although chakra's not the only thing it eats off of humans—it can devour you alive from the inside—"</p>
<p>"She mainly just eats chocolate," Sakura said.</p>
<p>Tsunade fell silent mid-sentence, mouth still open.</p>
<p>"She's a part of me," Sakura said. "And I love her."</p>
<p>Tsunade's eyes widened slightly. After a moment, she said warily, "There have been ninja in the past who have tried to use parasites like yours. Dangerous people. S-class criminals."</p>
<p>"So?"</p>
<p>"So?!"</p>
<p>"What were they like before they got an inner voice?" Sakura demanded. "Did the voice make them bad—or just make them strong enough to act on what they already wanted? I don't want to be a criminal!"</p>
<p>Tsunade frowned. "Sakura..."</p>
<p>"What about the people living with an inner voice that you've never heard about because the voice didn't consume them completely and they didn't become criminals?"</p>
<p>"Is this about Sasuke?" Tsunade asked, tiredly, like she was sure she was going to be asking that question a whole lot in the future.</p>
<p>Sakura froze for a moment, baffled. "Huh?"</p>
<p>"Is that why you want to keep this thing? Do you think it will make you strong enough to bring him back?"</p>
<p><b>Oh wow, I totally could!</b> Inner Sakura gushed. <b>I didn't even think of that! But yeah, all I need is a little more training to get even better at what I can already do!</b> Outer Sakura could picture herself shadow boxing in her mind's eye.</p>
<p>"It's not about Sasuke," Sakura insisted. "Maybe this does mean I can help more, but that's not why. She's part of me! You can't understand—"</p>
<p>Tsunade held up a hand. "Can you control it?"</p>
<p><em>Why should she be controlled?</em> The furious question came from Outer Sakura, not Inner Sakura. <em>Why is she only safe if she's my tool?</em> Inner Sakura was shocked silent.</p>
<p>But Sakura held that defense in—there were things women shouldn’t say out loud—and instead, she simply replied, "She listens to me. We listen to each other."</p>
<p>Tsunade studied Sakura’s face worriedly; then sighed, turned away, and looked out the window. After a moment, she said, “That parasite eats chakra, but... it’s also better at manipulating chakra than a human. I’ve only studied these things from a medical perspective, so we’re going to be making up a lot of this as we go; but if you’re <em>sure</em> you won’t get rid of it, then I can teach you what it does and hopefully how to make the most of its beneficial side-effects.”</p>
<p>It was probably as much an attempt to keep an eye on Sakura and her inner self as it was an offer to educate her. All the same—<b>Hell yeah!</b> Inner Sakura crowed. <b>We’re going to be the strongest girl in the world!</b></p>
<p>Sakura nodded. “Please. We want to learn.”</p>
<p>“‘We’?”</p>
<p>“We.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This is a very weird concept that was very fun to play around with so I'd love to hear why y'all think about it! Please yell at me and let me know, either here or on <a href="https://ckret2.tumblr.com/">tumblr</a>~</p></blockquote></div></div>
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